Unplanned Exchange Program
by soultaker78
Summary: A magical accident causes Raven and Toralei to switch places. Now Toralei wants to take a swing at Ever After High's status quo while Raven starts to enjoy herself at Monster High.
1. Chapter 1

Author's notes: this story takes place in continuity with all other MH and EAH stories I've done. The main things that have happened in those stories are as follows. In Monster High, there is a truce of sorts between Toralei (and the werecat twins) and Cleo (and her friends). At Ever After High, Raven has used her magic to give herself the ability to emulate a breed of Japanese superhero called Kamen Riders. I'll try to cover that stuff so it doesn't seem like it comes from nowhere and other details will come as needed.

Also, big thanks to my beta reader, Morantis.

...

It was morning at Monster High, about 20 minutes before classes started. Cleo and the three werecats, Toralei, Purrsephone and Meowlody were meeting in the catacombs under the school. The Egyptian princess was carrying a few of her family's mystical artifacts and was going to let the werecats play with them for a bit. Cleo didn't really like this idea, but had been pressured into it for the sake of maintaining the truce that had recently been struck between the werecats and her group.

"Be very careful with these," Cleo said as she opened her back and unveiled the artifacts. "These are powerful objects and should be treated with respect."

"This coming from the girl who's used them for petty stuff I-don't-know-how-many times," Toralei said with her usual snarkiness.

"Yes, but I can do that because they're mine," Cleo said in her own defense.

"Aren't they really your dad's?" Purrsephone asked.

"Technically yes, but..." Cleo started but was interrupted.

"And does he know how often you bring them to school?" Meowlody asked. This caused Cleo to pause for a few seconds as she thought of a response.

"If I let you have your fun," she began, "are you going to stop this line of questioning?"

"Yes," the twins answered in unison.

The werecats took some artifacts and began examining them. Purrsephone grabbed a golden scorpion that had much longer legs than a real scorpion and were arranged in part of a loop.

"This looks neat," she said in awe as she began looking at it from all sides. "What does it do?"

"Put the scorpion stinger on your arm like this," Cleo said as she placed the scorpion on Purrsephone's right arm with the tail next to her wrist. The legs clasped onto the werecat's wrist, securing itself in place. "Now imagine the tail shooting out like a harpoon."

Purrsephone pointed the scorpion stinger down the empty corridor and did what Cleo said. The tail shot out almost ten feet like Cleo described and then fell limp to the floor. Purrsephone commanded the tail to recede back to the scorpion stinger and it did so.

"So cool," Purrsephone said with a wide grin as she shot out the tail again and then it fell to the floor. "Get over here," she said under her breath as she pulled the tail back. _Jackson would have loved that_ , she thought about her recent boyfriend.

"And what about this?" Meowlody asked Cleo as she held up a silver armband with a purple jewel on it.

"That conjures a weapon for the wearer," Cleo said. "Usually a sword or a knife or in one case, a bow with self-supplying arrows."

Meowlody put the armband around her right bicep and thought about getting a weapon.

"Aaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh," Meowlody screamed as her forearm turned into a running chainsaw. After screaming for a few seconds, she used her left arm to remove the armband, changing her arm back. "That was... awesome!"

"There are so many reasons why that shouldn't have happened," Cleo worriedly as she saw that. _I'm already regretting this decision_.

Back in the catacombs, the werecats were still playing with Cleo's supernatural toys. Purrsephone was practicing using the tail of the scorpion stinger like a whip, the magic making the tail behave exactly how she wanted it to. Meowlody had grabbed another artifact and was trying to figure out what it did. Toralei had grabbed a small statue of an eagle and was using it to teleport around the group.

 _Things could be worse_ , Cleo thought to herself as she looked at the werecats. Toralei used the statue but wasn't reappearing yet.

...

At Ever After High, it was evening. Raven was had taken her magic mirror into Maddie and Kitty's dorm room.

"Thanks for letting me come here," Raven said to the Wonderlandians.

"No problem," Maddie said cheerfully.

"Why are you here again?" Kitty asked.

"I need a little time off from Apple," Raven said. With Legacy Day only a little more than a week away, many people were counting on Raven to get over her reservations about pledging to follow her assigned role, especially Apple. Raven wasn't sure yet what she'd do when it came time for her to take the podium but she knew she didn't want to think about it right now.

She placed the mirror against a spot on the wall while Maddie and Kitty did their thronework. She used her magic to 'tune' the mirror into the exploits of a man named Shouichi Tsugami AKA Kamen Rider Agito. She picked up from where she left off last time and watched his story unfold.

The rider in question was currently struggling with a red, scorpion-headed monster that wielded a shield and a small axe. With help from forces Agio was not aware of, his nearby motorcycle levitated off the ground and straightened out so the mass was horizontal. Agito jumped onto the changed vehicle and rode it like a flying surfboard. He charged towards the red scorpion monster when the screen on the mirror began flickering and Raven couldn't see what was going on.

"What the hex?" Raven said, having never encountered this interference before. The screen then went blank. Ripples like those on a lake's surface appeared on the screen and began forming with greater frequency. "That can't be good."

Raven was surrounded by some kind of green energy and was then hurled into the mirror. After being sent through, Toralei came out and stood where Raven once was, still holding the eagle statue. Maddie and Kitty saw this and weren't sure what to make of it: especially Maddie.

"Did Raven turn into an orange cat girl or am I just seeing things again?" Maddie asked out loud.

"I don't know who Raven is or where I am right now," Toralei began, "but the important thing to keep in mind is that I mean you no harm: unless you mean me harm, in which case I mean you lots of harm," Toralei said threateningly as she lowered the eagle statue.

"That's fair," Kitty said in a relaxed tone with her ever-present grin.

...

Back at the catacombs, Raven had appeared in the spot Toralei had been. _It just got worse_ , Cleo thought, not knowing what the sudden appearance of the normie girl meant but felt confident in assuming no good would come from it.

"What did you do with Toralei?," Purrsephone angrily asked Raven.

"What's a Toralie?" Raven responded in confusion while at the same time unable to shake the feeling that she had heard that word before.

"Wrong answer," Purrsephone said as she shot out the scorpion stinger, intending to wrap the tail around Raven's arm and intimated her from there. Raven had other plans as she used her magic to telekinetically grab the tail and deflect it from her, then pulled it with enough force to make Purrsephone fall forward to the ground.

"Now look here," Meowlody spoke up. "We can do this the easy way for the messy way," she said with a grin as she activated the armband and turned her arm into a chainsaw again.

"You'll have to do better than that if you want to scare me," Raven said as she summoned a large, silver belt with a purple stone in the buckle appeared around her waist and her right hand was surrounded by a purple aura as she called upon most of her magic. "Henshin!" Raven cried out as she channeled her magic into the belt and in a flash of black light, she was surrounded by a suit of black armor with silver trims and large purple eyes. She had become Kamen Rider Nocturnal.

"Oh shit!" Meowlody yelled as she reverted her arm back to its original form turned around and began running while screaming. She knew about Kamen Riders after Toralei had told her and her sister about the time she met one (1) and looked into them on the internet. She was running because she had just threatened to dismember a member of a group of warriors with an excellent track record at killing monsters.

"What's that about?" Cleo asked.

"I'm very sorry about that, Ms. Kamen Rider," Purrsephone said in a scared tone as she got back up. "We wouldn't have done that if we knew you were. It's just that our friend disappeared right before you showed up and we're worried about her and please don't make me explode!" Purrsephone loudly pleaded that last part.

"Nobody is making anyone explode," Nocturnal said reassuringly and then dispelled her armor. "For one thing, I'm pretty sure you're not even those kind of... monsters." As Raven said that, she remembered where she had the word 'Toralei' before.

Raven recalled a brief conversation with Cupid after witnessing one of Duchess Swan's frequent acts of bitchery. Cupid had said that Duchess reminded her of a girl named Toralei at her old school, Monster High, and that girls like them were a constant no matter what school or dimension you went to.

"Do you two go to Monster High?" Raven asked.

"Yes," Cleo said, doing her best to roll with the situation. "You're actually in the catacombs under the school right now."

"I didn't think it was possible," Purrsephone began, "but I'm even more confused now. How have you heard of our school?"

"I heard about it from a friend of mine who went here," Raven said. "C.A. Cupid."

"You know Cupid?" Cleo asked and Raven nodded yes. "Interesting."

Before this conversation could go any further, Meowlody returned from deeper in the catacombs and was dragging Operetta with her.

"There she is," the white-haired twin said in panic as she pointed at Raven. "Quick, scramble her brains."

"Yeah, ah'm not doin' that," the southern ghoul replied calmly.

"Now Meowlody," Purrsephone began, hoping to calm her sister down, "I know you're scared, but you don't have to be. She's not here to hurt us." She then turned to Raven. "Isn't that right... it just occurred to me that I don't know what your name is."

"Raven Queen," Raven said. "And I'm sorry I scared you by transforming but in my defense, you pulled out a chainsaw on me."

"You what?" Operetta asked as she looked at Meowlody.

"Yeah, I can do this now," Meowlody said as she raised her right forearm and changed it into a chainsaw again.

"Give me that," Cleo said angrily as she went over to Meowlody and unclasped the armband, taking it from the werecat and reverting her arm.

"As I was saying," Purrsephone said, "you know you shouldn't be afraid of her just because she's a Kamen Rider. You know how one of them saved Toralei's life."

"They've also killed hundreds of monsters," Meowlody retorted.

"Not monsters like us," Purrsephone said.

"What are y'all talkin' about?" Operetta asked.

"Long story short," Raven began, "I can become a type of armored warrior known as a Kamen Rider. Kamen Riders have a long history of destroying monsters, though only because those monsters were evil or working for evil organizations. I transformed earlier when she," Raven gestured at Meowlody, "did the chainsaw thing. She knew all of this and then ran away while making a big scaredy cat out of herself."

Operetta and Cleo giggled at Raven's choice of words.

"Also," Cleo interjected, "she apparently comes from the same school that Cupid goes to now."

"Say what?" Operetta asked with almost tangible confusion.

"I think," Cleo continued, "that we should take Raven to Headmistress Bloodgood and try to get everything sorted out."

"Sounds good," Raven said, understanding that due to her being a stranger in a strange land that making her presence known to whoever was in charge would be a great way to prevent further misunderstandings.

 _I could also learn more about how things work here_ , Raven thought to herself.

And with that, Raven, Cleo, Operetta and the werecat twins headed out of the catacombs.

...

At Maddie and Kitty's dorm room, Maddie had suggested that they all talk this out over tea, so she pulled out a table and hot tea pot out of her hat.

 _I'm not even gonna ask_ , Toralei thought. With everything she'd been through and seen at Monter High, Maddie pulling a tea set out of her hat wasn't that strange.

They all sat down at the table and were joined by Maddie's pet door mouse, Earl Grey.

"Now tell us about yourself," Kitty said while Maddie poured them all tea. It was decaf tea since it was near bed time for the two roommates.

"Her name is Toralei and she's from some place called Monster High," Maddie said.

"How did you know that?" Toralei asked in a worried tone.

"The narrator told me," Maddie cheerfully explained.

"The who?" Toralei asked with almost tangible conjusion.

"The voice in her head," Kitty explained.

"Ah," Toralei said, then blinked a few times as she realized that that raised even more questions. "Wait, that doesn't make any sense."

"Yeah, people say that a lot about me," Maddie said.

"What I mean is," Toralei said as she faced Kitty in the hopes that would give better responses, "how is her imaginary friend able to give her factually accurate information about me?"

"Look," Kitty started, "if I tried to understand every peculiar thing about Maddie, I'd go as crazy as she is."

Toralei looked over at Maddie, who was pouring tea onto the floor while cackling madly to Earl Grey. She nodded in agreement with Kitty and took a sip of tea. _This is really good_ , Toralei thought.

Toralei then began explaining what she'd been doing up until arriving in the Wonderlanders' dorm room. After explaining that, she walked up to their window and noticed that it was night outside.

"Strange," Toralei said. "Here's it's night. But about fifteen minutes ago at Monster High, it was morning." Thanks to her superb feline night vision, she could tell that the leaves on the trees were changing colors. "And it's fall: it's spring where I came from. Our universes must be in different time zones or something." Toralei then turned around at sat back down at the table.

"You don't need to be scared," Kitty said.

"I'm not that scared," Toralei responded. "I've gotten through taking some shrapnel to the stomach and almost having my soul eaten by a demon spirit thing: this shouldn't be too hard." Toralei then realized the weight of what she just said. "Why does this stuff keep happening to me?" she said in frustration.

After taking a deep breath to calm herself, she decided that she needed to be solution oriented. What she needed was to get a better idea of how things worked at this school. "Tell me about this place."

...

Author's notes: (1) this is a reference to another fic I did called 'the Cat and the Wizard', where Toralei was saved by a man named Haruto Soma AKA Kamen Rider Wizard.


	2. Chapter 2

Raven stepped out of the catacombs with the various monsters and into the hallways of Monster High. She looked around and saw all the various monsters noticing her and being very confused at why a normie girl was coming from the catacombs. Well, most were confused.

"Normie!" Manny yelled, he introduction of an unknown Normie within the school sending him into fight-or-flight mode, which in his case was just fight mode. He lowered his head and charged.

"Henshin!" Raven cried out as she summoned her belt and changed into Kamen Rider Nocturnal once more. She grabbed Manny's horns as he got near and she skidded back a bit before they both stopped.

"This is not good," Manny said with nearly tangible dread.

"You got that right!" Nocturnal yelled then took a deep breath to calm herself. "This is what's going to happen," she said with all the calm as she could muster. "I'm going to let you go. You are not going to attack me so I won't have any reason to make an indent of your face into one of these lockers. Are you we clear?"

"Yes, ma'am," Manny said in fear. Nocturnal let go of his horns and he straightened his posture.

"That was very stupid Manny: even for you," Meowlody said and then faced Nocturnal. "I'm so sorry about that."

"Do you know him?" Nocturnal asked as she dispelled her armor.

"He's kind of my boyfriend," Meowlody said as she awkwardly rubbed the back of her head.

"Okay," Raven said awkwardly. She then followed Cleo and the twins towards the Headmistress's office.

A few minutes later, they all made it to outside the office. Cleo knocked.

"Headmistress Bloodgood?" she said to get her attention.

"Yes," the headmistress replied.

"We have a problem."

"What kind of problem?"

"Toralei is missing and this normie girl is here in her place," Purrsephone said, then received an elbow to the side and a glare from her sister for her lack of tact.

"What?" Headmistress Bloodgood yelled as she walked towards the door and opened it, holding her head by the hair with her right hand.

"Head," Raven said absentmindedly with a 'deer in the headlights' kind of look.

"Ah knew we forgot somethin'," Operetta said as she rubbed her forehead in frustration, remebering that she wanted to warn Raven about the Headless Headmistress's unique look but forgot due to the incident with Manny.

"That's right, take it in," Bloodgood said in a tired but accepting manner. She had dealt with things like this before when she introduced herself to people who weren't previously aware of her 'condition' and was somewhat used to it. There was an awkward silence for about thirty seconds.

"Does it hurt?" Raven asked.

"Only when I lose my grip," Bloodgood said and then motioned for everyone to follow her inside. Bloodgood's horse, Nightmare, was laying down in the corner. She sat down, leaving her head on the desk. "Please explain what's going on."

"Well," Cleo began, "In the interest of maintaining the truce that has formed between me, Toralei and our various friends, my friends talked me into letting the werecats play around with some of my family's mystical artifacts."

 _And the plot thins_ , Bloodgood thought, not surprised that this happened due to one of Cleo's artifacts. But it didn't sound like it was entirely Cleo's fault this time and more importantly, they had bigger things to worry about.

"Toralei was playing with an eagle statue that grants the bearer the ability to teleport," Cleo continued. "She used it a few times, then she disappeared and Raven appeared instead of her."

"I'm Raven. Sorry about earlier," Raven said as she extended her hand.

"I wish we were meeting under better circumstances," Bloodgood said as she shook Raven's hand. "Do you know what happened to Toralei?"

"Not for sure," Raven said, "but if I showed up in the same spot she was, she probably went to the spot I was. I was in my best friend's dorm room with her and her roommate."

"How would they react to her taking your place like that?" Purrsephone asked.

"She should be fine," Raven answered. "Maddie's fairy friendly and Kitty... I don't actually like her that much, but she couldn't be that much of a threat to your friend. Interestingly, Kitty is also part cat."

"Really," Meowlody said with peaked interest.

"She's not like you though," Raven explained. "Except for some cat ears on her head, she looks human."

"That's different," Meowlody said. "So do monsters also go to your school?"

"I wouldn't say monsters," Raven said, "but while the school is mostly human, quite a bit of non-humans also go there. In fact, two of my friends include a girl who's made of wood and a mermaid who gets around on a wheelchair that's upholstered with a flying carpet (1)."

"So Toralei is in no danger of being killed by the normies at your school?" Purrsephone asked."

"Yes, and should I be offended that you keep calling me that?" Raven replied with a scowl.

"It's not meant as a slur," Cleo said. "That's just what we call you people."

"That's not as reassuring as you intended," Raven dryly countered.

"Ahem," Bloodgood said to get everyone's attention. "I think you ghouls should get to class while I try to sort things out with Raven."

"Before we go, you should know about this," Cleo said. While everyone else was talking, she looked for video posts of the incident with Manny earlier on her iCoffin and found one that showed the whole thing. She brought her phone in front of Bloodgood and played the video.

"I'll talk to Manny about this later," she said in a tired tone, then faced Raven. "Thanks for not beating the crap out of him, even though he gave you every reason to."

"You're welcome," Raven said. "If I had wanted to, I could have taken this out." She then materialized her main weapon as Kamen Rider Nocturnal: a black guitar/battle axe hybrid weapon that she dubbed the Night Axe.

"You and I are going to have to go over a few things," Bloodgood said.

"Yeah," Operetta chimed in. "For starters, where can ah get one of those?"

"Class, now," Bloodgood ordered the ghouls, who then complied. "This goes without saying, but I'm going to say it anyway: please don't kill any of my students."

"Okay," Raven said as she dispelled the Night Axe. "My armor makes me hard to kill so I don't have to resort to escalating a conflict."

"I saw that with Manny," Bloodgood said. "Do you have any idea of how you can undo this and get you and Toralei back to your proper worlds."

"I do not," Raven said with a hint of sadness. "I don't even know if anyone from my world has ever been to this one. On the plus side, there are powerful and knowledgeable magic users who work at my school. Once they find Toralei, they might be able to find a way to get her back where she belongs."

"We may have a problem there," Bloodgood said with a worried tone. "Let's just say that Toralei isn't big into cooperating with authority. She might not let her presence be known to whoever's in charge there."

"That's not much of a problem," Raven said. "Once the school's magic users notice I'm missing, they'll try to look for me. I'm kind of important," Raven finished with a sullen look.

"Is there a reason you don't look happy about that?" Bloodgood asked in a concerned tone.

"It's complicated: how much time do you have?" Raven asked.

"I'll make time," Bloodgood said. Raven then began telling Bloodgood about things worked at her school and how she was supposed to be evil even though that's not what she wanted.

Blood good took all this in while holding back the urge to judge Ever After High for preventing its students from choosing their own paths in life. She put that aside as she stood up, put her head on her and walked over to Raven to put a comforting hand on the girl's shoulder.

"I think you'll fit in well here," the headless headmistress began. "Most schools for monsters work along the lines of there's a school for vampires, a school for werewolf's and so on. What makes this school different is that all kinds of monsters go here. What makes this diversity work in a situation that is not conducive to it is that here, at Monster High, we encourage the students to disregard labels and embrace their individual uniquity."

"That's beautiful," Raven said as a single tear came from her right eye. She had always wanted people at EA High to stop trying to get her to follow her mother's path and instead let Raven be Raven. It was looking like she might have a chance at that here.

"I like to think so," Bloodgood said as she removed her hand. "What I'm getting at is that we will make you feel welcome for as long as you're here."

"Thank you," Raven said, immensely touched by Bloodgood's offer of generosity and contemplating how after knowing this woman for less than ten minutes, Raven already liked her many times more than headmaster Grimm.

"And while we're on the subject of making me feel welcome," Raven began, "I didn't bring this up earlier, but it was less than two hours from my bedtime at my world. I'm guessing it's morning here."

"It is," Bloodgood admitted. "You'd like somewhere to get some sleep." Raven nodded yes. "I can help with that, but we'll need to take a little ride." Bloodgood got Nightmare to stand and hopped on board her steed. She motioned for Raven to get on.

"I want to try something, but let's go outside first," Raven said. The two of them stepped out to the front of the school. Raven concentrated and summoned a demonic-looking portal on the ground. A black, female horse with red eyes and a saddle equipped jumped out before the portal disappeared. Raven went to hug this horse around her neck then turned to Bloodgood.

"This is my horse, Demona (2)," Raven explained to Bloodgood. She was very happy that the summoning spell worked just as well at Monster High as it did at Ever After High because that meant she'd have Demona alongside through this unexpected trip. "Give me a second to change," Raven said as she changed into Nocturnal again, not bothering with crying out 'henshin'.

Raven hopped on Demona and followed Bloodgood, who took them through the woods near the school. After about twenty minutes of riding, they came to a two-bedroom house with a small stable attached. They went to the front door and disembarked.

"This is my house," Bloodgood said as she unlocked the door. "You can sleep here for now. I'll be back around five with some ghouls who I think can help you adjust while you're here."

"Thank you," Raven said as she went inside. Bloodgood got back on Nightmare and went back to school.

...

Back at Maddie and Kitty's dorm room, the Wonderlanders had finished telling Toralei all about how Ever After High was designed to ensure that the children of fairy tale characters would follow in their parent's footsteps so that the various stories would live on.

"I'm going to be honest with you girls," Toralei began. "I find your school's mission statement to be philosophically... horrifying. And keep in mind that I do not scare easily what with going to a school full of monsters and almost dying twice, the first time giving me these." Toralei then raised her shirt and showed off her shrapnel scars, causing Kitty and Maddie to groan in disgust.

 _I love doing that_ , Toralei thought. Indeed, one of the things she liked most with meeting new people was getting to gross them out with her scars.

"I find that your school," the werecat continued, "being built to maintain the status quo and ensure that the future is nothing but more of the past to be appalling. What about personal choice and free will?"

"We are told that those things," Kitty began, "are less important than what is best for all." Toralei clenched her teeth and growled at this comment. "That's not my personal opinion on the matter, just what is taught at this school."

"Raven feels the same way you do, Toralei," Maddie said. "She's supposed to be evil because of the family she was born into but doesn't want to be. Personally, I'm looking forward to my destiny because it involves lots of tea but I think that just because I have no problem with that doesn't mean that everyone else should accept their fate."

"I knew there was something I liked about you," Toralie said with a grin. "What about you Kitty?"

"I think," She began, "that a little randomness in life is important to keep things from becoming stagnant and boring."

"I couldn't have put it better myself," Toralei said. "I need you two to not tell anyone that I'm here for a while."

"Why?" Kitty asked. "There are powerful magic users at this school who might be able to get you back home."

"And get Raven back here," Maddie said.

"I want to take a swing at how things are done here before going back home," Toralei said.

"That sounds like fun," Kitty said with her grin slightly wider than usual.

"I don't know," Maddie said. "Let me ask what Earl Grey thinks." She looked at the dormouse, who gave a squeak in response. "I'm in as well! But what hexactly are you going to do?"

"I am going to write a manifesto," Toralei said. "In it, I will detail all the things I hate about this school's system. Then I will distribute it throughout the school and hope it resonates with more people."

"Sounds good," Kitty said. She then got up and grabbed her MirrorPad. "You can write it on this."

Toralei took the device and examined it. It looked like a tablet computer but it had less casing and seemed to be mostly glass. It even had the same 'slide to unlock' mechanism. This confused the werecat for a bit before she decided to roll with it. She accessed the note making tool on the MirrorPad and began writing out the main points for her manifesto.

"I think I mentioned this earlier," Toralei began, "but it was morning for me before I got here. I'm not going to go to sleep for a long time."

"You can use the MirrorPad while we sleep," Kitty said. "But I'm going to need it in the morning."

"Deal," Toralei said

Toralei began working on her manifesto while Kitty and Maddie began getting ready for bed. Things were going well until Toralei heard a loud rumbling from outside. She looked out the window and saw large, thorny vines grow out of the ground and surround the school.

"Oh, what fresh crap is this?" Toralei said out loud.

"That's what you might call the school's security system," Kitty began explaining. "Every night, those vines grow around the school to keep anyone from getting in or out and the vines recede into ground come morning."

"I've heard of having a closed campus, but this is ri-frickin-diculous," Toralei said.

...

Author's notes: (1) Raven is referring to an OC of mine she met in earlier stories I did. Her name is Finelope (fin-el-oh-pe) and is the niece of the Little Mermaid.

(2) I came up with the idea of Raven becoming a Kamen Rider before I knew about her pet dragon, Nevermore, so Raven has Demona instead.


	3. Chapter 3

After leading Raven back to her house, Bloodgood had gone back to school. Later, she had asked Cleo if she and her friends could help make Raven feel welcome for as long as she was there. The Egyptian princess agreed, told her friends about Raven during lunch and were looking forward to meeting her after fearleading practice that day.

Unsurprisingly, Spectra was dying (or whatever word was appropriate in her case) to get the scoop on the normie girl that had showed up at their school and stopped Manny in his tracks. She had learned about Cleo being near her when she had first been seen and asked the Egyptian princess about interviewing the unexpected visitor. Cleo had agreed to this, mostly because it show the school that they had nothing to fear from Raven which would be good depending on how long she'd be staying.

At lunch that day, Cleo had gathered with her usual group of friends plus the twins to share the plan with them.

"I always like meeting new people," Draculara said in her usual upbeat tone.

"This is all well and good," Purrsephone began, "but Toralei's sudden absence creates a few problems. For one thing, her motorcycle probably shouldn't stay in the school parking lot while she's gone."

"Not a problem," Meowlody said. "I've ridden it a few times. I can get into her locker, grab the keys and get it back to her house."

"Well that settles one thing, but someone has to tell Toralei's pa…..," Purssephone paused as her eyes widened.

"Not it," both twins said at the same time and then stared at each other for a while.

"Since I'm taking the motorcycle, you should tell them," Meowlody said.

"You're going to be there any way, so you should tell them," Pursephone argued. "More importantly, I don't want to." Meowlody hissed at this.

"I'll do it if you two stop acting like kittens," Clawdeen said.

"Thank you," the twins said at once.

"Are you sure it's a good idea for you to be the one to break the news to Toralei's parents?" Draculara asked.

"I've met them before," Clawdeen said.

"You have?" Cleo said in surprise. "What are they like?"

"What you'd expect," Clawdeen lied.

"You're very brave," Purrsephone said. "I'm too scared to tell them, just like I'm scared of what could be happening to Toralei. She's alone, in a completely different world with no idea of anything works. And she has this bad habit of almost dying when she goes to new places without us."

"You give her too little credit," Clawdeen said reassuringly. "If Toralei survived what happened to her in Syria and Japan, she can make it through this."

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Draculara said. "How close are you to Toralei?"

"Kind of close," Clawdeen answered. "I'm just doing my part to keep the truce going."

...

It was around five o'clock at Monster High. Fearleading practice had ended and Cleo was gathering a group to go meet Raven. The group was made up of Cleo, Frankie, Draculara, Ghoulia, Clawdeen, Lagoona, Abbey, Spectra (who was greatly anticipating getting the exclusive with this extra-dimensional visitor), Purrsephone and Jackson (everyone figured that seeing another human would be good for Raven). They all made their way to Bloodgood's house. When they got there, Bloodgood went in while everyone waited outside and found Raven asleep on her couch. After being dropped off, Raven had practiced her guitar and fighting moves for about two hours and then fell asleep on the couch.

Bloodgood shook Raven awake. She sat up and gathered her thoughts.

"There are some people I'd like you to meet," Bloodgood said. Raven agreed to this and everyone walked into the living room.

"Hi, I'm Frankie," the patch-work girl happily introduced herself.

"I'm Clawdeen," the werewolf fashionista said. Ghoulia groaned something that Raven didn't understand. "This is Ghoulia."

"Abbey," the yeti girl said in her typically short manner.

"I'm Lagoona," the Ausie sea monster greeted.

"I'm Spectra," the ghost reporter said as she floated over and started recording on her tablet. "So tell us about yourself and how you came to be here."

"We're not at that part yet, Spectra," Purrsephone said then faced Raven. "Hi again. Don't remember if I brought this up last time but my name is Purrsephone. And this is Jackson." Raven's eyes widened when she looked at the half-monster.

"What is it?" Jackson asked.

"You look so much like this guy I know," Raven answered. Indeed, except for Jackson's blonde highlights and piercing, he could almost be Dexter's twin. In fact, he looked more like Dexter's twin than Dexter's actual twin, Darling. "What are you doing at a school for monsters?"

"It's a long story," Jackson said, "but the short version is that I'm half monster."

"He's also my boyfriend, so keep that in mind," Purrsephone said in her usual manner of stating whatever came to mind.

"Wait, he's your boyfriend?" Raven asked and the werecat nodded yes. "And your sister's dating that giant minotaur guy?" Purrsephone nodded yes again.

"And he used to shove me into a locker a lot," Jackson added. "Things were really weird at first, but it's gotten... less weird since then."

 _Only in relation to Manny_ , Purrsephone thought. While the situation with Manny and her sister had sorted itself out, there was still the problem of how Purrsephone had a sort of 'shared custody agreement' with Jackson between herself, Frankie and Holt, who were now dating as well. It was very awkward but Purrsephone felt that being with Jackson was worth it.

"There are a few things I want to bring up," Raven said then turned to Lagoona. "That is some accent you have: where are you from?"

"Australia," Lagoona answered.

"Never heard of it," Raven answered flatly then turned to Frankie. "Exactly what kind of monster are you?"

"I'm the daughter of Frankenstein's monster," Frankie replied.

"I'll ask for more information about that later," Raven said then faced Draculara. "And what of monster are you?"

"I'm a vampire," Draculara answered with a cheery tone.

"You're strigoi," Raven said in fright as she took a few steps away from Draculara and transformed into Kamen Rider Nocturnal once more, not bothering with the traditional cry of 'henshin'. "No way you're gonna drink me through this."

"Now Raven," Cleo began calmly, "you have nothing to be scared of. Draculara isn't even one of these bok choy things."

"Strigoi, and technically I am," Draculara corrected. "It's an old Romanian word for vampire. I haven't called that in almost five hundred years." Draculara finished with a nostalgic look.

"More importantly," Frankie interjected, "Draculara doesn't drink blood. She doesn't even eat meat: she's vegan."

"Vegan," Nocturnal repeated and then laughed uproariously for a few seconds. "Next you're gonna tell me that she doesn't have a stinger."

"A what?" Draculara asked.

"You know, the six foot tentacle things that shoot out of their mouths," Nocturnal explained and elicited confused and shocked looks from the ghouls.

"Yeah, vampires here don't have those," Clawdeen said with her hand on her hip.

"Oh," Nocturnal said as she dispelled her armor. "I am sorry about that. I had a bad experience with a Strigoi once. My mom, who was very evil, once invited over one: a man Einworst or Octhurst, something like that. Anyway, mom offered one of the castle servants as a hors d'oerve to the man. That's how I found out how Strigoi can drink a grown man to death in about five seconds. Did I mention I was seven when this happened?"

"You didn't," Purrsephone said with her eyes somewhat widened.

"So, yeah, sorry for that," Raven said awkwardly.

"Apology accepted," Spectra said enthusiastically as she floated over to Raven and resumed recording on her tablet. "Now tell us about yourself."

 _She's definitely this school's Blondie_ , Raven thought. She then began telling Spectra about how things worked at Ever After High and her role in the school's plans. She then talked about how she was watching stuff on her mirror when she got zapped to Monster High.

"Fascinating," Spectra said. "Now about what happened with Manny earlier: I talked with Meowlody and Purrsephone earlier and they explained how you're a type of Japanese superhero. How did that happen?"

"I learned about the Kamen Riders some time ago," Raven began. "There is a consistent pattern of how the mon... kaijin they fight are tied to the same source as their powers."

"Kaijin?"

"It's a Japanese word for monster. It occurred to me that I should be more selective with that word. Anyway, I felt that there were significant parallels between the riders fighting monsters from the same source as their powers and how I have dark magic that works best when I'm evil but I don't want to be evil. On something of a whim, I decided to see if I could use my magic to give myself rider abilities and it worked."

"So you're basically a huge fangirl?" Spectra asked.

"Yes and no," Raven answered. "I've been in one major battle before, so I feel that I've proven myself as a Kamen Rider and that I'm more than just a fangirl."

"Okay," Specrta said. "Now Cleo mentioned that you know C.A. Cupid. How is Cupid these days?"

"Cupid is fine," Raven replied. "She has a mirrorblog where she tries to help people with their romantic problems and is pretty universally well-liked throughout the school."

"That sounds right," Spectra said, glad that Cupid had fit in at this other school.

From that point on, Spectra asked some rather padding-like questions such as favorite color, favorite food and if she had been seeing anybody at Ever After High. Raven answered these questions and the interview ended.

"Now Raven," Bloodgood began, "since we don't know how long you're going to be here, you need something to do and a way to learn about this world. I think you should attend classes at Monster High while you're here."

"Thank you," Raven said, very grateful for being accepted in this way.

"What about your sleep schedule?" Clawdeen asked.

"That shouldn't be a problem," Raven said. "I can make myself sleep whenever and for however long I want. It's a basic spell magic users on my world learn to counteract insomnia, which is a common side-effect of tampering with magical artifacts."

"That's handy," Cleo said. "As for living arrangements, you are welcome to live with me. We'll go there after a brief stop at Draculara's place to raid her closet for some clothes, because you're currently overdressed for day-to-day stuff here."

"This isn't that dressed up by my world's standards," Raven said.

"Your universe sounds fabulous," Draculara said joyfully.

…

It was now morning at Ever After High. Maddie had sent an urgent hext message to two of Raven's friends telling them to come to her dorm room before going to breakfast, feeling that they deserved to know about the current situation with Raven. There was a knock at the door to the dorm room she shared with Kitty.

"So glad you could make it," Maddie said cheerfully as she welcomed C.A. Cupid and Cerise Hood into the dorm room.

"What's going on Maddie?" Cerise asked. "Why was it so important that we come see you?"

"We have a little problem with Raven," Maddie said awkwardly as she rubbed the back of her head. "It's probably best if I show you."

 _This is gonna be good_ , Kitty thought to herself as she watched Maddie take them to the corner of the dorm where Toralei was sleeping. Upon seeing the sleeping werecat, Cupid's eyes widened in recognition while Cerise was simply confused.

"There was an accident last night," Maddie began explaining. "Raven was watching something on her mirror and then she switched places with Toralei here."

"We need to get Raven back," Cerise said with a hint of panic and loudly enough to stir Toralei from her catnap.

"About that," Maddie began as Toralei woke up and noticed two new people.

"Who are you?" Toralei asked as she stood up and then took a closer look at Cupid. "You kind of look like this one ghoul who used to go to my school."

"I am that one ghoul, Toralei," Cupid said as she crossed her arms. "It's me: Cupid."

"Cupid," Toralei repeated in shock, deeply confused as to the vast physical differences between what she looked like now compared to her time at Monster High. "What did they do to you?" Toralei asked in fear as she took a step back.

"They didn't do anything," Cupid said indignantly, then looked at Cerise and Maddie, noticing that they were confused about the recent statements. "When I came to this school, the portal I used was enchanted so that my physical appearance would change to something that would help me fit in this world.

"So you haven't always looked like this?" Cerise asked.

"That's putting it mildly," Toralei said, then walked up to Cupid and touched one of her wings. "And what is with these feather dusters coming out of your back? The protruding rib-cage look was creeperific."

Cerise, Maddie and Kitty looked at Cupid with very confused expressions. Well, Kitty's eyes were confused while she maintained her signature grin.

"It's a long story," Cupid in a slightly frustrated tone. "More importantly, Raven will be fine if she's Monster High: the school is all about accepting people for who they are and there's this one group of fairy friendly ghouls there."

"That's great," Cerise said, "but we need to tell Headmaster Grimm about this so he can take steps to get Raven back and get you back home," she finished looking at Toralei.

"Not just yet," Toralei responded. "Kitty and Maddie have told me about all about how this school forces its students to fit predetermined roles. This disgusts me in ways I can't accurately describe," she said with a angry scowl. "Before I go back, I want to take a swing at the status quo here. I wrote up a manifesto last night and will distribute it tonight. Then comes the fun part: I'm going to show this school that despite it's best attempts at repression, they can't control everything."

"How are you going to do that?" Cupid asked nervously.

"I'm gonna hit this school with a wave of pranks the likes of which it's never seen," Toralie answered with a wide-eyed look and a grin that almost matched Kitty's.

 _I'm going to enjoy that part,_ Kitty thought with an even wider grin than usual, which nobody at EA High thought was possible.

"That's your plan?" Cerise asked skeptically. "A pranking spree."

"It's not just a pranking spree," Toralei began. "It's part of a larger campaign of psychological warfare: the only kind of warfare I'm capable of waging right now, which is just as well. Soldiers can be killed, weapons can be broken but ideas are much harder to destroy."

"That's true," Cupid said. "You can't publicly execute a belief or throw an opinion into the dungeon for the rest of its life."

"So I need you two," Toralei said to Cerise and Cupid, "to keep this all to yourselves for one. After I've done what I want, I'll turn myself in and then we'll get Raven back."

"All right," Cerise said. Toralei's plan to challenge the status quo seemed pretty well thought out. Cerise didn't really care for the way things were done either and it sounded like Raven would be fine until they got to her, so letting Toralei have her fun seemed like a okay idea.

"But what will we tell people when they start wondering where Raven is?" Cupid asked.

"As little as possible," Kitty said.

"This is all good," Cerise said, "but we need to get to breakfast while there's still food."

"That's fine: I want to get back to sleep," Toralei said, then went back to the corner she'd been in earlier and resumed sleeping.


	4. Chapter 4

Author's Notes: I'm taking a break from the developing plots to focus on how people are reacting to the disappearances of Raven and Toralei. Also, this chapter features some OCs of mine, but I don't think prior knowledge will be necessary.

Also, I accidentally uploaded another chapter instead of this one at first before correcting it a few hours later. Sorry for the confusion.

….

Right after school got out, Clawdeen got a ride from Meowlody on Toralei's motorcycle to Toralei's house. Clawdeen walked up to the door and rang the doorbell. The door was opened by a lizard woman with olive green scales wearing a black, flower print dress (which had a slit in the back for her thick tail). This was Toralei's step-mom (as far as most people knew), Komodoyoko Shishimura.

"Hi," Clawdeen said with her head drooped slightly in anxiety of what was about to happen.

"Hello Clawdeen," Komodoyoko said, then looked around and saw Meowlody next to Toralei's motorcycle. "Where is Toralei?"

"We should talk inside," Clawdeen said. They went to the living room and sat down on a couch while Meowlody stayed outside, deciding she didn't want to anything to do with what was to come. Clawdeen took a deep breath as she gathered her courage. "There's been an accident."

Clawdeen then began explaining how Raven switched places with Toralei based on what she'd heard from Cleo and that they had no idea how to get Toralei back.

"Why does this stuff keep happening to her?" Komodoyoko groaned in frustration and worry.

"You know how tough she is," Clawdeen said. "She'll be fine until she finds a way to get back to us."

"I know," the lizard woman said. "Thank you for telling me about this Clawdeen."

"No problem," Clawdeen said. They stood together in silence for a while. They didn't have anything to say and Clawdeen didn't feel right about leaving immediately after breaking the bad news.

Some time later, Clawdeen got another ride from Meowlody, courtesy of Toralei's motorcycle, to Bloodgood's house for the meet and greet with Raven.

…

At Ever After High, Apple was walking alongside her best friend Briar on their way to the castleteria now that it was lunchtime.

"I've been asking around like you asked," Briar began, "and no one as has seen Raven all morning."

"I see," Apple said. She'd been worried when she woke up this morning and found that Raven never came back to their dorm last night. But being the eternal optimist she was, she wasn't that worried. "She probably just decided to skip class today: how fairy evil of here," she said almost giddily. In Apple's mind, Raven starting to embrace evil by skipping class meant that she was going to sign the Storybook of Legends on Legacy Day.

"Maybe," Briar said skeptically.

Skipping class doesn't seem like something Raven would do, the narcoleptic princess thought. On the other hand, I can see why she might want to take some 'me time' with Legacy Day almost here. But where is she and when is she planning to come back?

Elsewhere, just outside the castleteria, an oriental girl with pale makeup over her face, wearing a dress with a sun pattern and her hair done up in an elegant bun with many accessories approached Cerise.

"Hi Michigo," Cerise greeted the daughter of the queen of Yamatai.

"Hello Cerise," Michigo returned the greeting. "I have not seen Raven today. Have you?"

"No," Cerise said. "But Raven is fine. Something happened to her that I can't talk about here." Cerise then leaned next to Michigo's ear. "I'll tell you more at the dojo later."

With that, Cerise went into the castleteria.

...

After classes ended, Cupid went to Kitty and Maddie's room to visit Toralei. She brought some chips with her because she had no idea what Toralei was doing for food while hiding here. She didn't know this, but Kitty and Maddie had snuck her some food earlier. Cupid knocked on the door and Kitty opened it.

"Don't touch any of my stuff while you have your chat," Kitty said and then teleported away to do other things.

Cupid walked in, closed the door behind her, went over to Toralei in the corner and shook her awake. "Hey," Cupid said as Toralei stirred.

"Hey," Toralei said as she stood up and accepted the chips Cupid offered. They stood in silence for a while as Toralei ate.

"So what's Monster High like these days?" Cupid asked.

"Oh, not much has changed," Toralei said. "Except for how Cleo and I have settled our issues with each other and we're all kind of friends now: that happened."

"What?" Cupid asked in shock. "How did that happen?"

"It's a long story. Purrsephone got the ball rolling on that without telling me. I thought that she'd betrayed me to join Cleo's group but that was really part of a plan to smooth things out between me and Cleo when I was content to keep hating her guts. Now that I've answered your question, I want you to answer one of mine."

"Shoot."

"Things look different in this world. The colors look brighter and things seem to move move more fluidly. Is that normal?"

"Yes. I noticed that too when I first got here. I think this world's got different laws of physics or something."

"Good. I was worried the accident that sent me here affected my brain." Toralei paused for a second as she found the words to say what she wanted. "I looked through MyChapter last night to familiarize myself with this world and I found something that worries me."

"What's that?" Cupid asked.

"I saw a disturbing lack of girls wearing pants or having hair smaller than their torsos. This, combined with all the focus on destiny and tradition makes me wonder: just how anit-gay is this world?"

"That's complicated," Cupid answered. "There is a vocal minority of people who detest gayness on the grounds of how it's untraditional but violent crimes committed against homosexuals are practically unheard of. Gay marriage is illegal here and gay people are barred from certain jobs, like military service or teaching. They can adopt children, but there's a lot of beuruecratic hoops to jump through."

"Damn."

"Why do you ask? Are you..."

"I refuse to put a label on what I am on the grounds that doing so would validate the misconception that sexual orientation is as simple as marking a checkbox on a form."

"That's fair," Cupid said in understanding. She was tempted to introduce Toralei to someone she knew who could talk to her more about this issue but right, Toralei's presence was supposed to be a secret. Maybe later, Cupid thought.

"On another subject," Toralei said, "I am greatly confused by how technology works in this world."

"You mean, how they've invented their own version of the internet," Cupid began, "but not things like cars or TV?"

"Yeah," Toralei said. "You don't think that's odd?"

"You get used to it," Cupid answered.

...

Meanwhile, at a private dojo in the Asian district of the village of Bookend, a well-toned Asian girl with short, black hair was running on a treadmill. Her name was Meiling, although the students of Ever After High knew her as Michigo. She was the daughter of Fa Mulan, China's first and greatest female warrior.

Due to the untraditional and subversive nature of her story, she was only allowed to attend EA High while assuming Michigo's identity. It was supposed to be a secret to all the students in the school but that didn't stop Meiling from sharing it with a select few: Raven, Cerise and her roommate, Finelope.

Cerise entered the dojo, walked up to Meiling and removed her hood, displaying her wolf ears. Meiling and Cerise knew about each other's secrets and Cerise saw the dojo as a sanctuary where she didn't have to worry about the world finding out the truth about her. Meiling got off the treadmill and greeted Cerise.

"What's happened to Raven?" Meiling asked.

Cersie began explaining to the well-toned girl about the current situation with Toralei's sudden arrival and Raven's unplanned trip.

"Raven will be fine," Meiling said with great confidence. Raven had been training at the dojo for weeks, working to acquire the fighting skills to go with her Kamen Rider abilities. "But how hexactly are we going to get her back?"

"I don't really know," Cerise answered. "After Toralei's taken her swing at the status quo, I'll turn her in and tell Headmaster Grimm about her and Raven switching places. Hopefully, he or Baba Yaga will have a way to get her."

"Good," Meiling said.

...

In the village of Bookend, there stood a slim white teenager with messy brown hair wearing a baggy, dark green shirt and khakis. This was Evan Chanter, son of the enchantress from 'Beauty and the Beast' and grade-A asshole according to almost everyone at EA High. After a while, the person he was waiting for showed up.

"Hello Faybelle," Evan greeted the future dark fairy.

"What do you want Evan?" Faybelle asked sassily.

"Raven wasn't at school at today," Evan said.

"That's not my problem," Faybelle retorted.

"And if she was killed by a Foundation X assassin as revenge for our stopping them and we might be next?" Evan asked, causing Faybelle's eyes to widen in fear and her wings to droop down.

"Then it's my problem," Faybelle admitted.

"Then you'll help me get answers," Evan said and lead Faybelle into an alley. The alley served as a teleporting way-point that Evan used to teleport himself and Faybelle into a cave in the dark woods that he used as on off-campus base. He lead Faybelle to a large, crystal ball. "You know what to do."

The two future villains touched the ball and began pouring their magic into it while mentally wondering where Raven was. After some time, the crystal ball showed them images of Raven at Monster High.

"She's at a school for monsters?" Evan asked aloud, greatly confused by this development.

"They're gonna eat her alive," Faybelle said. "Yay!" she exclaimed as her wings rapidly fluttered and lifted her off the ground. "Raven's going to die and pay for what her mother did to mine," she said while doing a cartwheel. "And the best part is, none of this leads back to me because I had nothing to do with it." Faybelle then stopped and looked at Evan. "Unless you think should we should do something about it."

"Screw her: I'm going bowling," Evan said, then teleported both of them back to Book End.


	5. Chapter 5

Author's notes: to those of you who read the last chapter soon after it was posted, it's not the same chapter anymore and you should double-check that.

…..

It was morning now as Raven walked into Monster High for her first day there alongside Cleo. She was wearing an ensemble consisting of a black jacket, pale purple top and black track pants. Once inside, she got a good look at how the student varied wildly based on shape and color. Her mouth actually gaped open at this.

"What are you looking at?" Raven was asked rudely by Gory Fangtell.

"I'm just appreciating how incredibly diverse this school is," Raven explained. "It's amazing."

"That's not what I first thought when I came here, but it does have it's appeal," Gory said. "My name's Gory. I already know who you are, Raven. Seriously though, you're not scared about being here?"

"I know that most of the monsters here don't mean me harm," Raven began. "Plus I can handle myself, as Manny almost found out the hard way."

"True," Gory said and then walked away.

"That went surprisingly well," Cleo said. "Gory's not usually so sociable. And you didn't freak out over her being a vampire: good for you."

Raven went to her first class of the day, which was art. Unsurprisingly, most of the students were girls. Raven began painting on a canvas while looking out one of the ghouls: a reptilian ghoul with yellow scales in an oriental dress. Raven worked on her painting while occasionally taking glances. After a while the reptile ghoul noticed this and walked over to Raven.

"Why do you keep looking at me?" Jinafire asked.

"I'm sorry," Raven said. "It's just that you remind me of two people I know: one I like and one who hates me."

"I see," Jinafire said, then went back to her esile and canvas and moved them next to Raven. Since this wasn't a typical lecture class, the students were allowed to talk to each other as long as they worked and kept the volume down. "Tell me more."

"The person who hates me," Raven began, "can turn into a humanoid dragon, like you, except her scales are black (1). And the person who I like is Chinese like I assume you are."

"I am."

"Although she's human and considerably more muscular than you from all the training she does."

"Is she an athlete?"

"No. Her destiny is to be a great warrior and that's what the training is for."

"I know quite a bit about Chinese normie culture and there is a legend about a great female warrior. Considering that stuff I heard about the school you came from being for children of remarkable individuals, I have to ask: is your friend connected to the story I'm thinking of?"

"If the story you're thinking of is the legend of Fa Mulan, then yes. My friend's name is Fa Meiling and she's Mulan's daughter."

Jinafire smiled widely and covered her mouth with her hand to restrain herself from squeeing like a fangirl. She was familiar with the legend of Fa Mulan and was ecstatic to find out that not only did she exist in another dimension, but she was now talking to someone who knew her daughter. Jinafire then said some stuff in Mandarin that Raven didn't understand.

"What was that?" Raven asked.

"Sorry," Jinafire apologized. "I got excited and reverted to my native tongue. That's amazing that you know Fa Mulan's daughter."

"I don't just know her," Raven continued, "she's been teaching me how to fight."

"Wait," Jinafire said, "you have magic powers and you've been learning the art of combat from the child of one of China's greatest warriors?" Raven nodded yes to this. "You must be quite formidable."

"I like to think so," Raven said with a grin. Jinafire then took a look at what Raven had been painting. It looked to be a thick, red fish tail of some kind.

"What are you painting?" Jinafire asked.

"It's going to be a picture of another friend of mine, named Finelope," Raven said. "She's a fat mermaid."

"That's different," Jinafire said.

After art, Raven's next class was history. That class incredibly boring and Raven struggled to stay awake through it and failed more than once. When class ended, Raven walked out with Frankie.

"I'm sorry about that Raven," Frankie said. "I'm used to that and I still come out drained."

"Are you talking metaphorically or electrically?" Raven asked. "Because I can help with the second one."

"Electrically," Frankie clarified.

"All right," Raven said as she materialized the Night Axe with a strap around her neck and held it like a guitar. She pointed the tip of the guitar at Frankie and struck a power chord, sending a bolt of electricity at the patch-work girl, reenergizing her.

"Thanks Raven," Frankie said excitedly. "I feel like a million volts."

Next was lunch, Raven said with a few of the friends she had made here and they small talked while eating until it was time for the next class. Raven was amazed at different this was compared to lunches at EA High. There she usually just sat alone when Maddie, Cedar or Cerise didn't have the same lunch period as her.

Raven's next class was music. Bloodgood had gotten her a flute from the music department's storeroom so she could participate. Raven enjoyed herself greatly during this class. After it was over, Operetta went up to her.

"You're really good," Operetta said.

"Thanks," Raven said.

"Are you just as good with your guitar?"

"Yeah."

"Want to jam later?"

"Sure."

"Cool. Meet me in the catacombs after school."

Raven smiled at this after Operetta walked away.

The rest of the day went well for Raven. She got through her last class no problem and then went into Operetta's place for their jam session. Operetta took out her guitar while Raven materialized hers. The two of them started playing some impressive rifts and were greatly enjoying themselves. They went on like this for about thirty minutes before stopping.

"That was great!" Operetta exclaimed. "The only way it would have been better is if Johnny was here. He really needs to stop getting sent to detention."

"I had fun too," Raven said while smiling. "The only other person I do this kind of stuff with at EA High is a guy named Sparrow Hood and it never ends well. He always gets upset when I won't let him play over me or try to tell him that he's not as great a vocalist as he thinks he is." Operetta rolled her eyes at obnoxious this Sparrow guy sounded.

"So how are you enjoying Monster High so far?" Operetta asked.

"Great," Nocturnal said. "Despite being a normie I think I fit in here better than I did at my old school."

"Glad to hear it," Operetta said. The two of them chatted for a bit while a rather strange thought occurred to Raven: could she stay at Monster High.

 _It's too early to decide that_ , Raven thought. _I should see how the second day goes then think more about this._

Raven said goodbye to Operetta and then left the catacombs.

...

It was morning at EA high as Apple and Briar were walking through a hallway. Even though classes hadn't started yet, toady was already an interesting day. Someone had posted a manifesto on the mirrornet criticizing the school's mission of ensuring that the children of fairy tail characters followed their parent's footsteps.

The manifesto's main point was that the current system's obsession with maintaining the status quo promoted rigidity and a refusal to adapt to the unforseen, then compared it to how a tall oak tree snaps in a powerful wind storm while a tiny sapling does not because it bends with the force instead of breaking. The manifesto then went on about the wrongness of forcing people into specific life paths so that the people on top could stay there. And lastly, that the system encouraged strong self-entitlement in children of royalty.

"Do you think Raven wrote the manifesto?" Briar asked.

"No, I don't," Apple said. "I know Raven has expressed issues with how things work here, but the manifesto is not written in a way that's consistent with how she talks. For example, Raven would never say that the royals were born with silver spoons up their... buts." The exact quote was 'asses' but since princesses never swore, Apple had to paraphrase.

"Okay," Briar agreed, "but I find it a hard to believe that's it's just a coincidence that this thing gets posted so soon after she goes M.I.A.." Apple stopped in her tracks after hearing this and had a concerned look on her face. "What's wrong Apple?"

"It's been over thirty-six hours since I last saw Raven," Apple began, "and I have no idea where she is or when she's coming back. I wasn't worried earlier, but I am now." Apple began walking again and regained her composure. "But you're right: the timing of the events is... weird."

Apple got to her locker and entered the combination. She opened the door and saw a small catapult inside that hurled a water balloon at her, which drenched her.

"What the hex?" a flustered Apple said in confusion. Briar looked inside a found a small note tied to the catapult. She untied the note and read it.

 **I'm guessing you didn't see this coming. And since your school discourages you from imagining possibilities outside of what you've been promised, you have no idea what to do about this. Something to think about while you dry off.**

 **Sincerely,**

 **Wouldn't you like to know.**

Briar showed the note to Apple.

"Yes, I would like to know," Apple said after reading it.

"I see what you mean now about Raven probably not being behind this," Briar said. "This isn't her style. If it's anyone's style, it's Kitty's."

"Wait," Apple said, "the same Kitty who was one of the last people to see Raven before she went missing?"

"Yes," Briar said as both princesses came to the same conclusion: with the water balloon prank likely tied to the manifesto due to the same talk of not being able to adapt, the prank being something Kitty would do and Kitty being one of the last to see Raven, Kitty could be behind all of it.

"We have to tell Headmaster Grimm," Apple said.

"And what good will that do?" Briar countered. "You know Kitty: she won't admit to anything unless she's caught in the act. And sometimes, not even then. We tell the headmaster, Kitty will deny her way out of trouble and then know we're on to her."

"You're right," Apple admitted. Kitty had been asked about Raven earlier but she had said that Raven left her and Maddie's dorm and had no idea where she was. "We need to get proof before going to the headmaster."

"Problem is, how do we do that?" Briar asked as she put her hand on her chin. "Kitty's fairy sneaky so she's going to be on guard for someone else's sneakiness. And she usually teleports from spot to spot instead of walking so it will be difficult to track her movements."

"I might have an idea for that," Apple said then looked down at her wet clothes. "But first, I have to change. Please save me some breakfast."

...

After getting changed and having breakfast, Apple went to her first class of the day, che-myth-stry. They broke into lab groups with Apple going towards her usual partner, Humphrey Dumpty. As usual, the two of them finished their assignment before everyone else due to being more focused on the task at hand.

"I need help with something, Humphrey," Apple said in a low voice so as to not be overheard.

"Are you feeling overwhelmed again?" Humphrey asked, referring to an incident some time ago where Apple confided in him about how so much is hexpected of her (2).

"No, but something is bothering me," Apple said and then began telling Humphrey about how she was worried about Raven and Kitty's connections to her disappearance and the manifesto. She finished with how it would be hard to track her movements.

"But then I thought," Apple continued, "Kitty may be an eccentric and mischievous troublemaker but she IS a teenaged girl: she probably keeps her mirrorphone within arm's reach at all times. It'll probably be a lot easier to track her phone than her. That's what I need your help with."

"You've come to the right egghead," Humphrey said with a cocky grin. "I was working on an app a few months ago, just to see if it was possible, that is exactly what you need." Humphrey pulled out his mirrortablet from his backpack and brought up the app in question.

"Get next to Kitty for like eight seconds," Humphrey continued, "and the app will force download a copy of itself on to Kitty's phone. You'll be able to use her phone's GPS to track her. You'll even be able to turn on her phone remotely and listen in on what she's doing."

Apple paused for a second with a nervous look on her face as she thought this over. On one hand, this app of Humphrey's made Apple uncomfortable due to ethical and legal complications but on the other hand, she really needed to know what Kitty was up to.

"You should be fairy careful about who you share this with," Apple said as she took out her mirrorphone.

"I know," Humphrey said as he downloaded the app onto Apple's phone. "I know I probably should have deleted it after I made it, but I decided to hang on to it in case I needed it for something: like helping you get the answers you need. I have no intention of sharing this with everyone."

"Good," Apple said as she noticed that the app was now installed. "Thank you so much for this, Humphrey."

"Anything for you, Apple," Humphrey said.

...

After that, Apple had run into Kitty between classes and asked about Raven again. Kitty and claimed to have no knowledge of the future evil queen's (if it were up to everyone but her) whereabouts. Apple had turned on Humphrey's app during the conversation and when Kitty walked way, she had looked at her phone, which displayed a message that said 'forced pairing successful'.

 _I'll need to talk to Humphrey about coming up with another term for that_ , Apple thought, not liking how the phrase 'forced pairing' sounded disturbingly rape-like.

Apple went about her day as usual until it was time for lunch. She met up with Briar and gave a quick synopsis of how she'd found a way to track Kitty's phone. The two princesses kept an eye on Kitty, who is in line to get food. Once she got her food, which seemed a bit more than someone of her size would get, she teleported away. Apple turned on the tracking app and after a few seconds, it showed that Kitty had gone to the dorms.

"What's she doing there?" Briar asked.

"Let's find out," Apple said as she led them to just outside the castleteria and activated the function that would turn Kitty's phone into a listening devise. They only heard someone eating at first but kept listening in the hopes that more information would follow.

 _"Has the manifesto gotten any noticeable results yet?" a female voice that Apple and Briar didn't recognize ask._

 _"Nothing major yet," Kitty answered. "People are more confused than anything else."_

 _"It's a process, Kitty," the voice replied. "It's like gardening: you have to sow the seeds of revolution, wait for them to take root and then... I started that metaphor without knowing how I'd end it but you get the idea."_

 _"I do, Toralei," Kitty said._

 _Who the hex is this Toralei and why is she talking about revolution?_ both Briar and Apple asked themselves mentally.

Kitty and Toralei chatted for a bit about the pranks they would set up later that night before Toralei said that she wanted to go back to sleep. Apple turned off the listening function saw that Kitty left her room.

"I say we go introduce ourselves to Kitty's guest," Apple said with a determined glare.

"Way ahead of you," Briar said as she showed Apple that she had one of Blondie's enchanted bobbie pins. Briar had asked to borrow one from the gossip hound earlier that day, anticipating that the ability to open any non-magical lock would come in handy.

Both of them then went to the dorms and let themselves in with the bobby pin. They found Toralei in the corner of the room, sleeping.

 _Apparently I'm not the only one who likes to nap during the afternoon_ , Briar thought. Both them were surprised that Kitty's guest was an orange cat girl that had more feline features than Kitty herself but were more interested in getting answers. Apple took a picture with her phone to verify that they found Toralei there and then lightly nudged the werecat with her leg. Toralei stirred, woke up, got a good look at someone she recognized as Apple from following Blondie's mirrorblog in an attempt to familiarize herself with this world and her eyes widened in shock.

"Shit," Toralei said out load.

"That's no way to talk to princesses, Toralei," Apple said with a stern look.

"And you know my name," Toralei said. She turned around quickly and knelt down to grab the eagle statue that had brought her to EA High and used it to teleport away.

"That could have gone better," Briar commented.

Toralei reappeared in the school's attic. She had scouted this location earlier as a fallback spot in case her ability to stay in Kitty and Maddie's dorm room was compromised. She wasn't afraid of the prissy princess but didn't feel like she had to explain herself: especially when there was more fun to be had.

 _But how'd she find out where I was and what my name is_ , Toralei wondered to herself and then let a yawn with part with of a meow in it. _I'll worry about that later._

Toralei then lied down on the floor and went back to sleep.

….

Author's notes: (1) Raven is talking about Faybelle. In earlier stories I did, she gained this ability thanks to a gift from Evan.

(2) this refers to the events of a one-shot I did called Breakdown.


	6. Chapter 6

Later that evening, Raven and Cleo were at her house having dinner. Cleo's dad was busy (unsurprisingly) so it was just them.

"You look like you have something on your mind, Raven," Cleo said. "Did your first day not go well?"

"It went great," Raven said. "I'm off to a fangtastic start fitting in here, as evident by how I'm starting to pick up on your school's lingo."

"Then why do you look like something's bothering you?" Cleo countered. Raven took a deep breath before continuing. She wanted to hold off talking about this until later, but decided to just get it over with.

"Today went so great," Raven began, "that I'm considering the possibility of going to Monster High on a more permanent basis."

"Oh," Cleo said. This took her by surprise because up till now, the plan had been for Raven to attend classes until someone from her world came to get her. This was a big change in that plan. "Have you thought about what staying here would involve?"

"I have," Raven began. "It would involve living off the generosity of you and your friends, abandoning the friends I have at Ever After High, possibly forever, learning more about this world and integrating into monster society as a human who likes to emulate a breed of superheroes famous for killing types of monsters."

"You don't want to try integrating into human society?"

"Not really, since I'm off to such a great start here. Anyway, those are the cons for staying. As for the pros, I would have the freedom to choose my own path in life, no longer have people hold stuff my mother did against me and I'd get to stay with the friends I've made here."

There was a pause for a moment as Cleo thought this over.

"Those are great points for both options," the Egyptian princess said. Cleo put her hand on her chin as she thought of her next response. "I'm not sure what you should do but know that I'll support whatever decision you make."

"Thank you," Raven said.

After Dinner, Raven went into the back yard and changed into Kamen Rider Nocturnal. She began going over all the moves Meiling had taught her so far. This reminded Raven of a point she forgot to bring up with Cleo earlier: if she decided to stay at Monster High, she'd need to find someone else to resume her training. She then decided that since she always considered being a Kamen Rider to be an odd hobby at most, that wasn't much of a problem.

But this line of thinking brought Raven to another thought as she materialized the Night Axe and began doing practice swings: could she abandon her friends at Ever After High?

 _I can make new friends,_ Raven thought, then immediately regretted how callous that thought was before resuming her train of thought. _My closest friends are Cerise, Cedar, Meiling and Maddie. I haven't known Meiling and Cerise that long and as for Maddie, she might get over it relatively quickly due to her weird brain._

Nocturnal readied the Night Axe and practiced axe swings while she continued thinking things over. While leaving her friends at EA High seemed more feasible now, that did not solve the myriad of logistical problems involved in making a new life for herself at Monster High. Nocturnal was still practicing a few minutes later when Cleo joined her.

"Raven," Cleo said to get her attention. "A thought occurred to me. You don't like how things are at your old school, which is part of why you want to stay here. But this Grimm guy wants you to follow in her mother's footsteps, right?"

"Yes," Nocturnal said.

"Maybe you could tell Grimm," Cleo said, "that you'll stay at Monster High unless he gives in to your demands."

"What demands?" Nocturnal asked.

"That would be up to you," Cleo said. "What do you think?"

Raven dispelled her armor and put her hand on her chin as she began thinking. Using the threat of staying at Monster High to improve her situation at Ever After High could work. And if Grimm called her bluff, she'd show she wasn't bluffing by making a new life for herself at Monster High, which she was leaning towards anyway.

"I like this idea," Raven said with a smirk.

...

After classes at Ever After High, Apple had contacted Kitty and told the future Cheshire cat that she wanted to talk to her in person in the woods just outside the school. She was going to confront Kitty about everything she knew and was going to do it alone because Briar needed to take her afternoon nap. She went to the woods and found Kitty.

"What is this about, Apple?" Kitty asked.

"I know all about Toralei," Apple said as she took out her phone and showed Kitty the photo that verified her statement. Kitty's eyes widened at this while her grin remained.

"Don't be fooled by the grin: I'm very nervous right now," Kitty in an uncharacteristically scared tone. "How much do you know?"

"I know she wrote the manifesto that went out," Apple began sternly, "along with the accompanying wave of pranks, which you helped her with and that you've been harboring you for... I don't know for how long but that's not important. I also know that I could go to Headmaster Grimm with everything I know and get you into serious trouble."

"You can't prove that she was behind the manifesto," Kitty snidely countered.

"Yes I can," Apple said as she tapped at her phone and played the recording she got from Kitty's phone.

"How did you get that?" Kitty asked in a frightened tone that was somewhat undercut by her grin.

"I raped your phone," Apple said.

"You what?" Kitty yelled in confusion.

"I mean I hacked your phone," Apple corrected herself. "But you're in luck, Kitty. I don't care about you: I don't even care about Toralei. All I care about is Raven. What did you to her?"

"I didn't do anything. It was an accident."

"What was an accident?"

Kitty took a deep breath before continuing.

"Raven was in my dorm room that night. She was using her mirror to watch some guy in weird armor, then Raven got sucked into her mirror and Toralei was in her place."

Apple paused for a while as she took this in. This hadn't gotten her any closer to finding Raven but she had an idea on how to get her back.

"I have to tell Headmaster Grimm about all this," Apple said. "You understand that, don't you?"

"I do," Kitty said in her usual coy fashion. "And I have a good idea where she is. And I'll lead you to her but first, how about a deal: you leave my name out of everything Toralei's been up to here and I'll leave out the part where you broke into my room and did something most likely illegal to my phone."

"That sounds fairest," Apple agreed.

Kitty then lead Apple to the school's attic and found Toralei on the floor, still sleeping. Kitty had already explained to her about their two dimensions were in different time zones (or something like that) so Toralei had spent her time here sleeping during the day and scheming at night. Apple saw the eagle statue next to her and grabbed it.

 _Not falling for that one again_ , Apple thought as she moved the statue behind a box so that Toralei wouldn't be able to find it right away. Apple then walked up to Toralei and nudged her awake with her foot. Toralei began stirring and noticed Apple and Kitty.

"Aw crap," Toralei said as she looked around for the eagle statue and didn't spot it. "Double crap," she said as she got up and then looked at Kitty. "Let me guess: you sold me out to save your own ass."

"Yep," Kitty admitted.

"You really are my sister from another litter," Toralei said in admiration and then hugged Kitty. She looked at Apple after breaking up the hug. "So what now?"

"I'm turning you into Headmaster Grimm," Apple said. "Hopefully Baba Yaga will be able to undo the accident from earlier and send you and Raven to where you both belong."

"Sounds good," Toralei said. "I'm starting to get sick of this place anyway. But I'll only go with you on two conditions: you try to get Grimm to punish me for the manifesto by sending me to my home dimension and that you keep Kitty and Maddie's involvement with me to yourself."

Toralei's reasons for protecting Kitty and Maddie were both emotional and practical: she felt very grateful to the wonderlanders for how they let her stay in their dorm room and didn't want to get them into too much trouble because they still had to stay at the school, but she also knew how they shared her disdain for how things worked and would most likely keep the ball rolling with her attempt to initiate social upheaval at EA High.

"I can do that," Apple agreed, then put her hand on her chin. "Although I'm going to have to come up with a story about how I found you."

"We'll tell him that I turned myself in to you because I'm bored and want to go home," Toralei offered.

"That will work," Apple said, and ten she and Toralei left the attic and began walking towards the Headmaster's office. They got a few stares along the way from students who were confused as to why Apple was walking alongside a cat girl they didn't recognize but they just kept walking. They made it to outside his office. "Headmaster Grimm, I need to talk to you about something important."

"I'm very busy Ms. White," he said from inside. "Please come back later."

"Open up you pompous blowhard," Toralei yelled. She had seen a few video of yammering on about the importance of the school's mission while she was browsing the mirrornet and took an instant dislike to him.

"Now look here young lady," Grimm said as she began walking towards the door. "I will not be spoken to in such...," Grimm opened the door and mouth gaped open in shock as he saw Toralei. It remained open for few seconds before he closed it and turned to Apple. "Who is this?"

"Toralei Stripe," Toralei introduced herself with a mock bow. "Devout believer in free will, amateur revolutionary and uninvited extra-dimensional visitor to this school." Grimm stood in shock for a moment.

"What?" he said to Apple.

"This is Toralei," Apple began. "She came here as the result of a magical accident that made her switch places with Raven. She also wrote the manifesto that made a splash earlier today."

"I see," Grimm said with narrowed eyes. "And what is she doing with you here right now?"

"I turned myself into Apple," Toralei said, "to negotiate the terms of my punishment for what I've done here, which I feel should be to be sent back to where I came from. Seeing what I've done here in two days, I imagine you're pretty interested in the idea of kicking me out of your entire universe."

"Fairy much so," Grimm said. "I'll contact Baba Yaga so she can start working on a way to get rid of you and get Raven back but for now, I can't let you walk around the school freely."

 _Uh oh_ , Toralei thought.

...

Toralei had been lead to the quarantine room the school infirmary had for any students that caught contagious illnesses and placed inside it. Apple had gone to the library and got Toralei some books to read, grabbing a varied selection from what was popular due to not knowing what Toralei's tastes were. After that, Apple had brought the eagle statue to Baba Yaga and explained how the accident happened. Baba Yaga had deduced that the statue and the mirror must have somehow interacted with each other and was attempting to see if the accident could be duplicated.

Toralei had napped for a bit after being shown into her 'cell'. She woke about two hours later and saw the books Apple had left, along with a note explaining their presence. She picked a book and started read it for about ten minutes before she heard a knock on the door. She looked through the small window on the door and saw that it was Blondie Locks. Blondie opened the door and let herself in.

"Hi," Blondie said and as she entered and was followed in by Dexter holding her mirror tablet. "I was hoping we could interview you. I'm Blondie and this is Dexter." Toralei growled about at this. "What's that about?"

"Sorry," Toralei apologized. "I was reminded of a Dexter I knew, who I liked at first but then was really disappointed with later."

 _That series finale sucked so much ass_ , Toralei thought. _Then again, with the way the show kind of stumbled forward its last few seasons, it didn't so much end as much as be put out of its misery._

"Anyway," Blondie began, "I just want to say that it's a pleasure to meet you. You may find this strange, but my roommate is a girl who used to go to your school and I've a heard about you before."

"What? Dexter asked.

"Cupid used to go to monster school. I never mentioned that."

"No. Pretty sure I would have remembered that."

 _Not surprising_ , Toralei thought, understanding why Cupid wouldn't want to test her luck by telling everyone that she used to go to 'monster school'.

"Anyway," Blondie said to Toralei, "I know it's going to be a little strange that I know a little about when you don't know anything about me but from what Cupid tells me, I'm a lot like someone at your school named Spectra so keep that in mind."

"That will not be hard," Toralei said dryly. "I saw a few of your mirrorblog posts in an attempt to familiarize myself with this world, so I do know a little about you and that you are a lot like Spectra."

"Great," Blondie said cheerfully. She got into position next to Toralei as Dexter held up her mirrorpad and started filming. "Hello Ever After," Blondie said to the camera. "This is Blondie Locks here with the school's uninvited guest-slash-ideological radical, Toralei Stripe. Say hi Toralei."

"Hello, free thinking-impaired blind followers," Toralei said with scorn to the camera.

"We'll work on that later," Blondie said. "First thing's first: how safe is Raven at your school?"

"I'm sure she's fine. A human goes to my school and while he had trouble fitting in at first, he's never been attacked. Well, he's actually half-human half-monster but that's another thing."

"All right. Second, why did you write that manifesto and pull all those pranks?"

"Because the this school's mission is an affront to the concept of free will," Toralei said. "The manifesto says everything relevant about my thoughts on that, so I won't waste time going over it again. As for the pranks, it was a follow-up of sorts to show how not everything can be predicted and accounted for despite what everyone tells you." Toralei had a surprised look in her eyes.

"What is it?" Blondie asked.

"It just occurred to me," Toralei said, "that I went to pretty significant lengths all to help a school of mostly humans with a problem many of them don't even know they have. That's a little odd considering I've hated humans for most of my life."

"Why?"

"A group of humans killed my uncle before I was born: that kind of thing affects your outlook. I only got over it a few months ago because a human saved my life."

Toralei had decided in advance to be selective with her words. She had chosen not to refer to any of the school's inhabitants as normies because she wasn't in a great position to offend them with what might be considered a slur. She also decided that the school wasn't too interested in hearing about how she was saved by the magical Kamen Rider, Haruto Soma.

Blondie had a few other fluff-like questions for a while before Toralei switched gears.

"Now that I've answered your questions," Toralei said, "maybe you can answer one of mine: do you have any idea when I'll be going home?"

"I talked with Baba Yaga earlier," Blondie said, "and she says that she should be able to get you back in about a day."

"Good," Toralei said with a smirk that would have made Kitty proud.


	7. Chapter 7

Author's Notes: I couldn't think of anything for Raven to do this chapter, so I didn't bother.

…..

Toralei had spent all night reading one of the books Apple had given her due to having nothing else to do. She was still up when Apple came to the door with her breakfast.

"I'm surprised you came," Toralei said as she took the food. "Thanks for the books. I spent all last night reading one and it kept me from dying from boredom."

"You're welcome," Apple said. "I was hoping we could talk some about your opinions regarding how things work here. And by talk, I mean I'm going to hexplain why the system is better than you made it out to be."

"Fine," Toralei said as she started eating.

"It's important that our parents' stories get retold here," Apple began. "When the stories are retold, they spread out to other worlds and get told there, inspiring the inhabitants of countless worlds. I know you disagree, but I feel that is a tradition worth upholding: especially when the alternative is ceasing to exist."

"About that: do you know of anyone who has actually ceased to exist from not pledging to follow their parents story?"

"No. Everyone pledges their destiny because they know how important it is for them to do so."

"Or they go along with it because there's no alternative that doesn't involve dying," Toralei countered with a dry tone.

"What hexactly are you implying?" Apple asked.

"I'm implying," Toralei began, "that there is no danger of ceasing to exist from not signing that book: you are all told that so that you're too scared to think of anything that doesn't involve following your pre-asigned fate."

"You're wrong," Apple said indignantly. "Headmaster Grimm would never lie to us."

"Really," Toralei said with almost tangible skepticism. "From what I understand, he has a pretty cushy position with running this school and making sure all the students follow their fates. Can you honestly tell me that he doesn't benefit from restricting everyone's options so that things stay the way they've always been?"

"No, I can't," Apple replied awkwardly. "And I know the system is highly restrictive, but that's a good thing. With everything under tight control, the chance for unforeseen unpleasantness is almost non-existent. Surely you see the value of that."

"I do," Toralei said as she rubbed her shrapnel wounds. She definitely believed in the importance of not having one's path in life decided for them but if things had been under tighter control in her world, then she wouldn't have had a near brush with death and that was something she could have gone without. "But with everyone so focused on keeping things the ways they've always been, change is unlikely to happen. Particularly, the kind of change that involves putting an end to old prejudices."

Apple had an awkward look in her eyes, like Toralei's words hit uncomfortably close to home.

"I think I struck I nerve," Toralei said with a smirk. "For all your talk about wanting to keep things the way they are, you understand that change can be a good thing."

"I do," Apple admitted. "I think that gay people should have the right to get married but I keep that to myself because it's something of an unpopular opinion at the moment. I'll allow gay marriage in my kingdom once I'm queen and it's too late for anyone to stop me."

Apple felt good confiding this in someone. She wasn't worried about sharing this with Toralei: if the feline told anyone about this, Apple would simply deny it and it was highly doubtful that anyone would take Toralei's word over Apple's.

"See, you understand the benefits of fluid thinking," Toralei said with a slight grin. "Like when I hit you with that water balloon prank earlier. I thought that you'd be so flabbergasted from something like that happening out of nowhere that you'd have no idea what to do. Instead, you adapted and went from not knowing I existed to finding out everything I've done while here in just a few hours."

"I got lucky," Apple said with a hint of nervousness over how correct Toralei was in regards to the importance of changing your thinking to the situation. Apple then took a deep breath and took a stern expression on her face. "Nothing you can say will make me change my mind about following my destiny. Having said that, I conceded your point about change not being inherently bad. I'll even concede that a strong adherence to tradition encourages close-mindedness, which hinders an end to bigotry and adaptation-based thinking."

"I suppose that's all I can ask for," Toralei conceded. After spending so much time in quarantine, she had come to realize that planning to cause sweeping change by herself in just a few days was overly-optimistic of her. She was willing to settle for getting the ball rolling for other people while she went home. Toralei then held her hand in front of Apple. "Despite our differences in opinions, it was nice meeting you."

"Likewise," Apple said as she shook Toralei's hand. Even though Apple hadn't cared for how the werecat had went about it, she had to admit that Toralei had raised some interesting points about how things worked at Ever After High: points that couldn't be ignored simply because she was speaking out against the status quo or because she was an outsider.

As for Toralei, she had been expecting Apple to be like Cleo: vain, stuck-up, domineering, not terribly bright. She knew now that while Apple wanted to fulfill her destiny, she was also deeply concerned about what was best for everyone. Toralei had never been so pleased to be wrong.

...

Toralei was sleeping in her makeshift cell at Ever After High when she was woken up by a knock on the door. Toralei stirred, looked at the hole in the door and saw that it was Cupid and a girl she didn't recognize. Cupid opened the door and came in bearing lunch from the castleteria.

"Who's your friend?" Toralei asked as she grabbed the food.

"I'm Lilly Bo Peep," Lilly said, identifying herself. "Pleased to meet you. Now Cupid tells me that you're curious about how homosexuals are treated at this world.

"That's right," Toralei admitted. "Are you...?"

"Yes, I'm gay," Lilly said. "The worst I've had to deal with is mean looks and name calling. Beatings against gay people aren't unheard of, but they're fairy rare. Fortunately, I don't have to worry about that: no one's going to come after someone with a story to fulfill over a disagreement about proper sexual preferences. And since my story doesn't involve a predetermined partner, I don't have to worry about getting together with a guy or going against my destiny."

"But what if someone with your preferences did have a story with a predetermined male love interest?" Toralei asked. "What would happen then?"

"I have no idea," Lilly admitted. "It's never come up before. But if someone like me who has a story with no predetermined love interest, it would be pretty safe for them to tell everyone about their sexual orientation, Cupid." Lilly finished this last part while looking at the winged girl.

"Wait, you're...," Toralei started.

"Bisexual," Cupid finished. "Lilly's the only one at this school who knows so far. Before I came here, I was warned about how traditional this school is so I decided that telling everyone about me being bi would not be the best idea. Now that I've been here awhile, I know that I could be honest about who I am but then people might be pissed at me for keeping it a secret in the first place."

"That's rough," Toralei said in convincing false sympathy. "So are you and her...,"

"It's complicated," Lilly answered.

"While here, I've been doing my usual thing of helping people with their romance problems," Cupid began. "One day, Lilly came to me, hoping I could help her deal with her massive, unrequited crush for Apple. At the same time, I was dealing with similar issues about someone else. We talked for a bit, she kissed me, I kissed back. We started making out with each other but there were never any feelings beyond physical attraction involved. After a while, I decided to call it off because I didn't think it was healthy how we were using each other to avoid our own issues."

"I see nothing wrong with what you had," Toralei said. "I wish I had something similar to that going on with Clawdeen."

"What?" Cupid said in shock. "But when I was at Monster High, the two of you were at each other's throats almost everyday. I imagine things have smoothed over now due to this truce you talked about, but to smooth over that much... can you please explain more?"

"Things are complicated between me and Clawdeen as well," Toralei began. "She knows how I feel about her and has expressed interest in returning my feelings but she wants to take things slow for right now because of how we were at each other's throats for so long."

"For what it's worth, I hope you two get together," Cupid said.

"And I hope you two make headway in dealing with your issues," Toralei said.

…

Later that night, Headmaster Grimm and Baba Yaga came to see Toralei.

"We're ready to get you out of here," Grimm said sternly.


	8. Chapter 8

Author's notes: and now we reach the end of the story, which will look familiar to some of you. I realize I probably didn't take this concept as far as I could but I feel it's more important to write a short, to-the-point story than to start something with no idea of when/if it will be finished. If any of you think you can do a similar story better than this, please feel free to try.

…

Baba Yaga had examined the eagle statue and Raven's mirror and had determined how to duplicate whatever made Raven and Toralei switch places. When Grimm learned this, he decided that he and Baba Yaga would personally take Toralei back to Monster High and then bring Raven back. They got Toralei and took her to Raven's mirror in Kitty and Maddie's dorm room. Since they knew about the time difference between worlds, they timed it so that they would arrive in the morning at Monster High, around the time classes would start.

Baba Yaga touched both the mirror and the eagle statue while Grimm and Toralei touched her back. All three of them arrived at the same spot in the catacombs where the switch had occurred. As Baba Yaga deduced, the accident had created a soft spot between worlds in the areas where it occurred.

"This isn't what I expected for monster school," Grimm said as he looked at the cavernous passageway.

"This is just part of the school's catacombs, jackass," Toralei clarified and then lead them to the entrance to the school.

"I'm going to enjoy never seeing you again," Grimm said contemptuously.

"The feeling is mutual," Toralei replied with a wide smile.

"In that case, you'll love this," Grimm said with a smile of his own as he turned to Baba Yaga. "Do it."

Baba Yaga brought her hands together and a light blue aura started glowing around her. She held her hands out and the aura went over Toralei.

"What did you do to me?" Toralei asked in panic.

"If Baba Yaga's magic worked...," Grimm started.

"Which it did," Baba Yaga interrupted.

"Then you have been barred from ever returning to our plane of existence," Grimm finished.

"Like I ever wanted to return to your crappy universe anyway," Toralei yelled then continued leading them to the school entrance. They made it there, opened the door and entered the halls of Monster High, gaining the attention of the monsters walking about.

"Not again," Manny cried out in frustration, not happy to see the unexpected arrival of more normies to the school. It took him a few seconds to get over this feeling and notice that Toralei was with them. "Oh, hey Toralei. The twins will be glad to know that you're back."

"Hey Manny," Toralei returned the greeting then turned to Grimm and Baba Yaga. "The headmistresses office is this way." Toralei lead them to the office and knocked. "Hi."

"Toralei," Headmistress Bloodgood said in shock at hearing the voice of someone who'd been missing for three days. She went to the door, opened it and briefly hugged Toralei. Despite being a massive pain most of the time, she was overjoyed to see her student come back. Bloodgood then broke apart from Toralei and noticed the people with her.

"This is Baba Yaga and Headmaster Grimm of Ever After High," Toralei introduced them as they went into the office and Toralei walked over to Bloodgood.

"You're not what I expected for someone running a school for monsters," Baba Yaga said in curiosity to Bloodgood. Bloodgood then removed her head and held in next to her chest. "That's more like it."

"Enough niceties," Grimm said seriously. "Where's Raven?"

"I'll get her," Bloodgood said and then took out her icoffin. Cleo had gotten one for Raven and then she and Bloodgood shared numbers in case of emergencies. She texted Raven that she needed to come see her right away. A few minutes later, Raven entered the office.

"Oh, you're here," Raven deadpanned as she saw Grimm.

"Yes Raven, I'm here," Grimm said in a tone indicating he was not pleased with Raven's initial reaction. "It's time for you to come home."

"About that," Raven said as she held up her hand. "Maybe I don't want to go back: maybe I like it here."

"What?!" Grimm exclaimed in shock and anger.

"You heard me," Raven said defiantly. "I've only been here three days, the first of which I slept through, and I've been accepted here more than I've ever been at Ever After High."

"Now let's talk about this Raven," Baba Yaga said calmly.

"All right," Raven replied with a smirk as she crossed her arms. "I might be willing to go back to Ever After High, provided some concessions were to be made about following my destiny."

"Unacceptable," Grimm coldly declared.

"In that case," Raven shot back with a glare, "please say goodbye to everyone at EA High for me. I need to get to class." Raven then turned around to leave the office.

"Wait," Grimm said with a hint of panic, causing Raven to stop and turn around. Typically, he would never negotiate with one of his students over following their destiny but it was incredibly important for Raven to play to her part in Apple's story. "What concessions are we talking about?"

"We'll talk about the specifics in your office," Raven clarified. "I want anything we decide to be written down on the really fancy stationary to make any agreements as binding as possible."

"Of course you do," Grimm said bitterly.

"But I want to say goodbye to my friends here first," Raven said as she pulled out her icoffin and started texting some of the ghouls to come to Bloodgood's office.

"That's fine," Grimm said then turned to face Bloodgood. "Meanwhile, we can talk about what this one," he angrily pointed at Toralei, "did at my school."

"What was it this time?" Bloodgood asked.

"She pulled a number of minor pranks on my students," Grimm began, "but more importantly, she attempted to spread dangerous ideology that criticized the infallibility of our status quo and encourage the students to think for themselves."

"I see," Bloodgood said calmly and faced Toralei. "What do you have to say for yourself?"

"This guy sucks ass!," Toralei defiantly cheered.

A fair counterpoint, though crudely put, Bloodgood thought. Between what Raven heard of how things worked at EA High and briefly meeting its headmaster just now, Bloodgood decided that she was justified in disliking this man. She was tempted to defend to Toralei's actions but that would probably involve Grimm staying around longer and she really wanted him to leave.

"I will make sure Toralei is punished," Bloodgood lied. A few minutes later, Frankie, Draculara, Cleo, Operetta and the werecat twins arrived in Bloodgood's office. Raven began hugging the ghouls she felt closest to and saying goodbye while the twins went over to Toralei and hugged her.

"Do you have to go?" Draculara asked. "We can work something out for you to stay here."

"I'm very tempted," Raven began, "but there are many issues involved with staying in this world that your generosity alone won't solve. Besides, I've talked Grimm into giving me some leeway with my destiny." Raven went over to hug Cleo. "Try that thing we talked about tomorrow," she whispered into Cleo's ear.

Cleo reclaimed the eagle statue from Baba Yaga. With that out of the way, the three people from Ever After exited the office and went to the catacombs. Bloodgood then faced Toralei.

"You'll be glad to know," the headless headmistress started, "that I'm not actually going to punish you for anything you did at Ever After High: I only said that so that Grimm would leave this school sooner."

"I figured you would," Toralei said with a grin, unsurprised that Bloodgood saw nothing wrong with her trying to bring Monster High's values to a school that desperately needed them.

"What did you do?" Clawdeen asked accusingly.

"It's quite a story," Toralei said with a wide smile.

Raven, Grimm, Baba Yaga went to the spot in the catacombs where all this had begun. Baba Yaga brought her hands together and sent them back to Maddie and Kitty's dorm room. The two wonderlanders were not present, having been instructed by Grimm to stay out until told otherwise.

"Let's go to your office now," Raven said as she began walking and was not joined by the two adults. "What's going on?"

"Do it now," Grimm ordered. Baba Yaga brought her hands together and cast an aura over Raven just like the one she cast on Toralei.

"What did you do?" Raven asked worryingly.

"Baba Yaga just cast a spell that will prevent you from going back to Monster High," Grimm explained. "Just in case you had any plans of duplicating the accident that sent you there."

"Why would I do that?" Raven asked. "You're about to give me what I wan... oh." Raven's eyes widened in realization as she just put together what Grimm was up to. "You never had any intention of making a deal with me."

"That's right," Grimm said smugly. "Legacy Day is in two days. You are going to pledge your destiny and do hexactly what you're supposed to. And don't even bother telling anyone about how I brought you back here: if you do, I'll deny it and no one will take your word over mine. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes," Raven glared at him.

Asshole, Raven thought as he and Baba Yaga left. Having been deceived by Grimm and deprived the option of going back to Monster High, Raven was more determined than ever not to follow her destiny. You've won this battle Grimm, but the war has only just begun.

Raven grabbed her mirror walked out of Maddie and Kitty's dorm room and was amazed at how many people were standing in the hallway. Maddie, Cerise, Cupid, Hunter, Cedar, Meiling (dressed as Michigo), Finelope, Dexter, Apple and Briar were there, most likely awaiting her return to EA High. Raven lowered the mirror to the floor as Apple went up to her.

"You're back," Apple said as she grabbed Apple in a big, hug. "I was so worried about you. Are you all right?"

"I'm fine, Apple," Raven said as she returned the hug and then looked at all the people who were happy to see her back, pleasantly surprised that the number was higher then she had expected.

Maybe not staying at Monster High won't be so bad after all.

...

The next day at around 8:50 P.M., Raven was focusing on pissed she was at Grimm as she channeled her magic into her mirror. As she did this, an image came into focus on the mirror. A few seconds later, the image focused into that of Cleo's face.

"It worked!" Raven cheered with raised arms. She had left her mirrorphone behind at Monster High with Cleo, hoping that she could use her magic mirror to connect with it and talk to her ghoulfriends. She had been able to tap into greater reserves of her magic by thinking of how angry she was at Grimm for attempting to keep from seeing them again which had helped in establishing the connection.

"Yes Raven, it worked," Cleo responded dryly. Draculara and Frankie went in front of the screen and said hi as well.

"And I'm here too," Toralei said as she brought the screen to her face. "We've never met before but I think you know who I am."

"I do, Toralei," Raven said. She had heard about the werecat from Kitty and Maddie and got a description from them along with a recounting of what she'd done at EA High. "And I thank you from the bottom of my soul for trying to change people's minds about things work here."

"You are fairy welcome," Toralei replied with a grin. "How did it go with getting your concessions from Grimm?"

"It didn't," Raven responded with a sad look.

"He f *ked you in the back, didn't he?" Toralei asked.

"Yeah," Raven answered with an angry glare and then explained how Grimm had barred her from ever going back to Monster High, then revealing that he never had any intention of negotiating with Raven.

"That guy's an even bigger dick than I thought!" Toralei yelled.

"That was pretty much my first thought too," Raven admitted.

"What are you going to do now?" Draculara asked.

"I'm going to continue trying to forge my own path in life instead of following the destiny people like Grimm have chosen for me," Raven declared. "And now I have a new reason for wanting to do that: being a pain in Grimm's ass."

"Sounds good," Toralei grinned back.

"But enough about me: let's talk about what's going on there," Raven said. They all small talked for the next several minutes. Raven was overjoyed beyond words that Grimm's attempt to keep her from physically going to Monster High had not resulted in all contact being completely severed with her new friends.

….

Author's notes: there will be a follow-up to this based solely on the Ever After side that will come out sometime in the future. Be on the lookout for that if interested.


End file.
